Kirby Ferguson

I have an interesting story about inspiration.

Fresh out of Brigham Young University, a man named Stephen Hales was having trouble figuring out a logo for his design agency, Stephen Hales Creative. He had spent weeks working on concepts for the logo but nothing felt right, until one day he was getting into his car when he accidentally spilled a drink of coffee or something similar. When he looked at the ground where the beverage had splashed, he saw what appeared to be the silhouette of a bearded man clutching at his scalp, a representation of the design process: both frustrating and enlightening. He used the spilled drink as inspiration for what would become — and is still, today — the company logo.

Anything can be inspiration, depending on the lens you have on when you encounter it.

Research has shown that even subtle things we don't consciously acknowledge have an impact on our ability to solve problems or generate ideas (i.e. to "inspire" us). The trouble is that, because we aren't always consciously aware of what is inspiring us, we credit creative "sparks" to current conditions and stimulus, even if what really sparked that solution or idea in your mind was really inspired by a billboard you passed on the freeway four days ago or a book you read when you were younger.

As a result, we waste quite a bit of time "seeking" inspiration. We feel like understanding where others gets their inspiration will somehow magically help us to find it ourselves more often. But…

Have you heard of Rocket Internet - (Samwer brothers) they have become experts in how to copy recently funded companies although hated by startup communities everywhere. Worth googling them and you will likely find lots of information. They are strong at execution putting alot of money and people on a project from day 1.

If you zoom in on a couple of cases such fab.com or airbnb.com, it is intesting to observe what happened. In Fab.com's case, Rocket internet were getting geared up to copy Fab as Fab was growing fast. Jason Goldberg wrote a letter to all the designers on fab.com and published a post on his own blog saying that it was pointless to copy them. Fab.com deals with designers, and designers hate when people copy them so it was very likely designers wouldn't want to have anything to do with a copy and the rocket clone failed. Airbnb bought smaller competitors, not the rocket clone managing to get around the clone that way.

Then there is the question, "are clones useful?" In some cases, very much so. If a startup wants to expand fast, one avenue it can take is to grow fast in a large city and then acquire the smaller clone startups elsewhere which have already tested how the idea needs to adapt to that context. This would be faster than organic growth.

Lastly, you realise everything is a remix. http://www.everythingisaremix.info/everything-is-a-remix-the-ted-talk/ Almost every idea is a copy of the last. I used to work for an extremely famous designer, people…

Exactly. Every patent that I've seen (for example, Apple vs. HTC) boils down to complete bullshit. I'd welcome someone finding a non-bullshit patent that Android is clearly violating (possibly something with Java? They don't use any of the JVM technology and I don't think I could consider programming language semantics patentable).

Relatedly:

Google seems to feel entitled to copy whatever it wants. Android copies the UI from the iPhone. Places copied data from Yelp. Google+ copies from Facebook. Their coupon thing is a clone of Groupon. And yet it’s Google that acts as though it has been offended when these competitors fight back.

For a man who is so in love with Everything is a Remix [1], this strikes me as an odd position. Once things like this are up for grabs, you can start pointing fingers all the way back to the first transistor. There's a thick line between "remix" and "ripoff" and I've yet to see Google cross it in a significant manner.

[1] http://www.everythingisaremix.info/

There's a great video essay series known as "Everything is a Remix" by Kirby Ferguson [1] if you have an hour to spare. Ferguson uses the trends of music sampling as a base for how artists draw inspiration from others. The controversy of sampling has been used across genres, include around minute 9 Ferguson points out that Led Zepplin were considered ripoffs for their appropriation of Jake Holmes. Axis of Awesome also has a "chord progression song" [2] that makes fun of how similar many pop songs are.

The video draws a nice parallel to how so much in our world serves as "inspiration" for our own works, but acknowledges the controversy around using a single source as "too much inspiration". Especially as we move into whatever copyright arguments are getting made toward AI right now, I think it serves as a nice outline on why this is such a complicated matter.

[1] https://www.everythingisaremix.info/everything-is-a-remix-2023

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pidokakU4I

It's also almost 50 years since "An Open Letter to Hobbyists"[1]. It's amazing that in the last 30+ years, the "hobbyists" managed to turn the entire software industry by 180°, and that Microsoft themselves are reliant on that work.

Bill even specifically mentions musicians. By 1976, when blues was only ca 100 years old, most bands would play what we now call "covers", credit each original writer on the back of the record, and there was no shame or stigma around it. Art builds on art, and "stealing" is probably the most important part of the process[2].

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Open_Letter_to_Hobbyists

[2]: https://www.everythingisaremix.info/watch-the-series/

I am really disappointed in the reaction of Maisel, and other photographers who're supporting the result of the lawsuit. Even if Baio copied the image pixel-by-pixel, what harm was done? Did anybody buy the Bloop because of the album artwork? Or because of the music? Come on, people! Show some common sense! A fine of a few 100 dollars would have been enough.

On a tangential note: this is well worth a watch: http://www.everythingisaremix.info/watch-the-series/
No wonder pop music today is so crappy.